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It was part of the punishment. Lose your place in heaven, lose it completely. Not just the space, but your place in the minds of the angels still in Her grace. They would never remember him, and he would never be able to tell them.
“Well that one went down like a lead balloon,” he said. But what he wanted to say was It’s me, Aziraphale, it’s Rafael. Please say you remember me.
But he didn’t remember, and he wasn’t Rafael anymore. He had lost his name too, along with everything else.
'Crawley', they had renamed him and he hated it. Like some creature squirming at your feet. Like a snake.
But that’s what he was now.
Once, he had hung stars alongside the Almighty. Now he slithered in the dirt.
“Bit of an overreaction if you ask me,” he said. “First offence and everything.” And he meant that. Not just for the two banished humans, but for himself. All I ever did was ask questions he thought. Was that so terrible?
At least they still had each other thought. They had lost their home, but they hadn’t lost everything. Not like he had.
“Makes you wonder what God’s really planning,” he said, and he did wonder; was this all a part of that great, ineffable plan? Was he always supposed to fall? When he and Aziraphale had sat together in heaven, eyes and hands locked together, was it already written that someday, the angel - his angel - would look at him and see only a demon and a stranger?
And why? He had only asked questions. He’d never meant to fall.
“You’re an angel. I don’t think you can do the wrong thing,” he said, but he knew that wasn’t true, or else he wouldn’t be stood there with black wings and a name that wasn’t his own, next to an angel who didn’t know him.
“What if I did the right thing,” he said, and he hoped, deep down, that he had, that he could still do the right thing. That his falling had meant something, had a purpose. That it wasn’t just because he’d asked questions. That it was part of a greater plan.
Show me a great plan he wanted to say. Show me a reason why you had to cast me out. Show me a reason why he can’t know me.
Later, he would try to talk to Her. On his knees, calling out to Her, please, please, if nothing else, just let him remember me.
He would be met with silence